Minority Report 2017/18 - Sunderland

I enjoy reading your stuff, but you are completely at odds with me and everyone around me regarding Lindsay. Sorry to say this, but I do sometimes wonder if you deliberately court controversy by expressing a view that you sort of know everyone will disagree with. You may be a better judge than the rest of us, but my view, for what it's worth, is that Lindsay was excellent throughout.

 

Your deliberations on the York meeting have been riveting in their detail, even though I have no great interest in matters equine. It make Minority Report look like the dribblings of an idiot.

 

Well I'm sorry that I have lost a fan, but I can assure you that I do not say things for effect. In fact, I very rarely make criticisms of individual players because, on the whole, I agree that it is not helpful

I can also assure you that those around my neck of the stands agreed fully with what I have written on here. The game is all about opinions, and when we do not agree, we simply have to agree to differ.

 

My view is that the guy who was pulled back was not denied a clear goalscoring opportunity. I thought that Davies was a bit slow off his line, but he may have been first to it in any case.

 

I wasn't going to respond to Red Rain but glad you have. We have a 21 year old centre half making his home league debut, keep our first clean sheet of the season and after the first 15/20 minutes play really well IMO yet he tears the lad to pieces! Unreal Tbh!

 

That's fine. Strange how differently people see things. When Lindsay made one absolutely beautiful pass at one point today I actually thought that this might be the best central defender we have had since Arjan. Clean sheet into the bargain. Always room for improvement I guess!!!

 

I'm baffled about your feelings regarding Lindsay having a bad game.
Where I sit, all of us in the Ponte End thought he was fantastic.
What a game to make his debut !
He must have felt under pressure but he dealt with what came at him with coolness and calm.
He's learning.
His first Championship game !
To say he had a "Stinker" is harsh and unreal.

 

I disagree. He may have had a moment or two (who doesn't?) but he was far from awful all things considered.

 

Liam Lyndsay 'awful ' ?

I suspected that you craved attention, that barmy comment proves it.

 

He's no better judge than anyone. It's one persons opinion. No more or less.

 

I remember the pass that you refer to, and you are right that it was a really good pass. The balance of my opinion is not arrived at because he hit one good pass. In the first half, he had two passes blocked because he dawdled on them. Again in that first half he was far too far away from the other centre back on several occasions. Is this important? Of course it is. Central defenders are a unit that can cover each other if they stay close. If they are dragged out of position, they are individuals and easier to beat. They should always play as a pair. In the second half, he was obviously tiring, and when a player tires, his natural instinct is to give himself a start on an attacker who he fears may beat him for pace. This is all well and good, except that it creates a kink in the offside line, space behind the other centre back that is still on-side. Did no-one see him balloon a clearance from the left edge of the box to the right edge because he totally mistimed an easy clearance.

Look, I do not want to come down on the lad. I hope he has a good career at Oakwell. He will improve, and it is not my style anyway, but I saw what I saw and the persons on either side of me saw the same things and came to the same conclusions. We would all have had him off at half-time because we saw that he could well be sent off in the second half. As it was, Sunderland failed to turn up for the second half, so he avoided the pressure that the booking put him under. But that does not make us wrong to put safety first.

 

Well you and your buddies are of course entitled to your opinions but me and my buddies had a very different view of Lindsay's debut. Naturally he was unsure at times of his position early on at but that was at a time when Sunderland were flooding through our midfield. If you check the highlights you will see that it was his inch perfect 40 yard pass which started the build up to our first critical goal. It's my opinion that your opinion that he had a stinker is utter nonsense. That aside I do enjoy reading your reports.

 

The 'howler' by Lindsay wasn't even his fault, it was Davies for being incredibly slow and indecisive off his line.

Granted after the mistake by Davies, and the subsequent foul by Lindsay he should have walked.

 

This is going to sound really elitist, but I am going to say it anyway, because it is true. When you sit behind the goal, everything is either coming toward you or going away from you. And yet the off-side law means that the players play in lines across the pitch. From behind the goal you have no depth of field, no sense of space, no idea of the problems that the off-side rule places on attacking players, or help that it gives to defensive players. Watching the game from behind the goal is territorial and it is tribal, it is the home for the fan who wants to engage with fellow fans, who wants to feel part of the team, who wants to feel the joy of being part of a whole. But it is not the place to watch from if you want to understand the game, how it is played, what is going on and why. We each watch from of favoured positions, and I imagine that we take different things from the games. You would not swap your position for mine and vice versa, but have you ever wondered why TV in shot from the side, or why both sets of coaching staffs watch from the side rather than at either end. It is because it is the best place to understand what is going on.

 

That doesn't make your opinion any more valid than hers or others. I had a superb view from the commentary box and I called a red card for his challenge. But that aside, I thought he did very well on debut. Not superb, but neither was he awful.

But it's the BBS and folk love to call it black or white.

 

Liam Lindsey will become one of our clubs finest central defenders.It shouldn't take you long too realise that.

 

Of course it isn't black and white. The fact that I thought Lindsay had a poor game today does not influence my opinion on his next game. I am honest enough to judge players on individual games, and I hope that I can say that Lindsay had a good game the next time I see him. But if he has a good game next time, it will not make him any better today. I am honest enough to judge him on the facts of the day and I have given reason why I thought he was poor. Everyone says I am wrong, but aside from one long pass, the evidence about his defending being up to standard is pretty sparse. Sunderland did not score, but was that us or was that them. Our midfield played pretty deep that second half. Most of the time there were 9 lined up to stop them. I credit the whole team for keeping a clean sheet, and Hecky for the way he set them up. I do not credit the centre back who caused me so much anguish during the game.

I remember a certain young man from Hemsworth telling me that another player was the next big thing, when I never saw it. Whatever happened to them?

 

It's an opinions game my friend. You posted that he was awful, everyone disagrees, me included. Doesn't make anyone right. Merely opinionated.

I reckon he was decent. I'm enthused by his performance. I do not believe it's a coincidence that we got our first clean sheet in his first game.

Yes he made an error or two, but for once we weren't made to pay.

As I say, it's a game of opinions, but it seems bizarre that anyone tonight is knocking any of our players, let alone the 21-year-old making his debut in defence after a 3-0 win.